


Quinn's Song

by stellacadente



Series: What Came Before [5]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Music, Pre-Relationship, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-14
Updated: 2017-02-14
Packaged: 2018-09-24 11:49:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9723728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stellacadente/pseuds/stellacadente
Summary: In which an angry, frustrated (and probably hungry) Sith gets mowed down by a schoolboy’s music composition.





	

Xhareen slammed the datapad on the table in the galley so hard, Vette nearly dropped her mug of caff.

“You know you just broke that, right?” Vette said, clutching the mug in case her Sith friend wasn’t done.

“I don’t care,” Xhareen spat back. She opened a cabinet door so hard, it flung back and closed again. “Sorry, Vette. I’m not angry at you. It’s …”

“Let me guess. Captain Starchpants.” Like she even needed to guess.

“He’s adamant that I do these reports. Which he sends to me fully completed anyway. Why can’t he just put my mark on them and send them on? Why are we even filling out Imperial military reports? This is a Sith vessel.”

It seemed safe, so Vette put her mug on the table. “Yeah well …”

“And then … THEN! He quizzes me about the contents of the report. I don’t care about hyperdrive optimization. I shouldn’t have to. Damn Baras for not telling me I’d have to go through all of this just because he gave me a ship.”

“You know you could just …”

“So you know what he did next? He sat me down and called up a 3D schematic and started to teach me hyperspace physics! Like I’m some fidgety child who just needs a little one-on-one instruction! Urrrghhh!!!”

“To be fair, I’ve never seen you sit still for more than a minute,” Vette said, shocked she got to finish a sentence. Clearly, Xhareen had just gone past her ability to use her words.

“Listen. Just go to him and remind him whose ship this is if you don’t want to do these things. If he starts to quote regulations, make him quote the regulation that requires Sith to do any of it.”

Xhareen took in a deep breath and let it out. “You’re right, Vette. That’s what I’m going to do.”

She stormed out of the galley before Vette could suggest a cup of calming tea.

~~~~~

Xhareen would swear later she felt the music before she heard it, a common observation for a Miralukan. But what she was about to experience was anything but common.

The rolling opening notes brought to mind a gentle rain, right before the downpour begins, that point when the individual drops want to cry out one last scream before being lost in the deluge. But then, just when you would expect the storm to take over, a plaintive cry of notes calls out instead. She listened, expecting to hear thunder and maybe the wailing of a child for a lost parent.

It was, all at once, immensely terrifying and yet profoundly reassuring.

Quinn must have heard her come in, because he abruptly stopped the playback. Xhareen gasped.

“Apologies, my lord. I didn’t hear you come onto the bridge. Are you alright?” he asked.

“That was the most beautiful song I’ve ever heard, Quinn,” she whispered, as though out of breath.

“Oh. That.” He blushed, though just a touch.

“‘ _Oh. That_?’ You say ‘oh, that’ to such a profound piece of work?” Xhareen was certain she was shaking violently, but hoping he didn’t notice.

“I, well, that’s just a composition piece a classmate and I wrote in prep school. He found it recently among some old files and sent me a copy.”

She put up her hand, which was trembling slightly. “Wait, you wrote that?”

“Yes. I wrote the open, and my friend Stellan devised the melody.”

“That’s you playing?”

He nodded. “Yes, my lord. I was never good enough to study performance professionally. Just maybe a bit above average for a stuffy aristocratic boy from Kaas City.”

She regretted calling him that. Reading his technical reports wasn’t so bad as to insult him for something he had no control over.

“I’m sorry I said that, Quinn.”

“It’s no matter, my lord. Was there something you wanted?”

“What?”

“Was there some reason you came to the bridge?”

She had left the broken datapad in the galley. “Yes, I came to get a new copy of that report so I could go over it.”

He looked puzzled. “What happened to the datapad I gave you earlier?”

“It’s been repurposed.” Which hopefully meant Vette and Toovee could repair it, eventually.

“Ah, well, yes. Let me find a suitable one … yes, there it is. Just a moment, my lord.”

He turned to the comm station and began to download the report data to a new pad.

“While you’re at it, could you include a copy of that music, please?”

He blushed a little more. “Certainly, my lord. I’m honored that you like it.”

Leave it to Quinn to create something so stirring that she almost collapsed under the weight of its beauty, and then to be nearly oblivious to its effect on her. She didn’t really want to have to deal with this stupid report, but the few minutes she would lose to Quinn’s insistence on military protocol were worth it if she could just hear the song again.

“Thank you, captain,” she said as he handed her the datapad. She turned to leave. “I will finish shortly.”

~~~~~

~~~~~

That wasn’t how he’d planned on sharing the song with her, but all things considered, Malavai Quinn was pleased with how it had turned out.

**Author's Note:**

> The song in question is the main theme from HBO’s The Leftovers, one of my favorite shows ever, by the brilliant Max Richter. This is not the version originally posted with this story, and that is described in the story. That has been taken down. I do not own any rights to this work, but claim fair use as a transformative work.


End file.
